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Reuters

Confirmed: Wealthiest Americans live along the coasts

The richest Americans are clustered together in densely populated counties along the east and west coasts, with a metropolitan area in Connecticut and one in California leading the pack, the Census Bureau reported on Monday.

A large number of counties in the Pacific, mid-Atlantic, and New England regions had “high concentrations of high-income households,” the Census found. “In contrast, the East South Central division’s counties tended to have unusually low concentrations of high-income households.” …

The area encompassing Bridgeport, Stamford and Norwalk in Connecticut, had the largest concentration of wealth with 17.9 percent of households in the upper 5 percent. That area is close to New York City, and its Wall Street wealth.

It was followed by the heart of the Silicon Valley, with 15.9 percent of those living in San Jose, Sunnyvale, and Santa Clara, California, bringing home some of the highest incomes in the country.

That concentration is because of the financial services industry in NY and all the tech stuff in California. Given how highly mobile both industries are, I’m kind of shocked those people stick around and put up with the taxes and dysfunctionality of those states.